


Comment-fic Collection

by ammcj062



Category: Highlander: The Series
Genre: Comment Fic, Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-22
Updated: 2016-12-10
Packaged: 2017-12-09 04:45:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 6,555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/770120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ammcj062/pseuds/ammcj062
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Various Highlander fills done for comment-fic prompts. Most of them center around Methos. Added recently: Chapters 22+</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Run

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Highlander, Methos, you must never run from anything immortal. it catches their attention.

You must never run away from anything Immortal; it catches their attention. Instead, master the art of nonchalance. Adopt the lifestyle of obliviousness. Don the cloak of innocence. Do not run when a walk will do; do not walk when an amble will suffice. Slouch when you can. Never be in a straight line, whether you be lying down, sitting, standing or walking: curl into yourself, tilt your body sideways, cock a leg askew, zig zag through the crowd. Like a leopard uses its spots to distort its shape, obliterate your presence by scattering misconceptions throughout yourself. Couple the wary hand on your hilt with an awkward elbow-bend. Disguise the scanning eye with a myopic squint or a lingering glance of appreciation. Override the initial tingle of Presence with an allergic sneeze. Distort yourself and blend into the background. Wait for them to pass you by. Be patient until they dismiss you. Breathe a sigh of relief when it is over. Forget how you could make them run.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander, Methos, What comes after the Apocalypse has always been more interesting than the cataclysm itself.

Methos has always compared apocalypses to a really satisfying sneeze – the kind that happens when entering a dusty room or walking by someone wearing too much perfume. Your eyes water and your nose scrunches up and the back of your throat tickles until you expel it all with one decisive sneeze. Then the people around you startle, shift away, and invoke deities to bless what remains of yourself. 

He thinks it’s quite an apt metaphor. 

Much like a sneeze, the best part of an apocalypse is not the action itself, violent and convulsing and inevitable, but what comes afterwards; a sense of cleansing, of expelling that which irritated and abraded. Systems – governments, religions, philosophies and the like – only end, you see, when they no longer work. If they cannot adapt, they die, and leave in their place fertile ground for those better equipped to handle the situation to flourish. That is the way with everything.

Methos looks forward to those post-apocalypse days with anticipation. They are his favorite times in history, because once old orders have fallen the new explode into being. There are so many new advancements Methos can barely keep up with them: changes in art, science, history, philosophy. Everything he has learned becomes obsolete in the face of this new paradigm.

He devours it all voraciously, change like a breath of fresh air after the staleness of a cavern. He sheds the old ways and embraces the new, laughing all the way at the new contortions mortals put upon themselves. The shapes will soon become cramping and tiresome – but in the moment there is a joy to this new movement, a novelty to the world as they reinvent it. 

What comes after the apocalypse has always been more interesting than the cataclysm itself. It's something Immortals, static in time and perpetually preserving memories, never have the opportunity for: the miracle of rebirth.


	3. Older Than Dirt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander, Methos, older than dirt and twice as tired

Five thousand years is a long time to be alive – to laugh and love and fight and fuck and at the end of everything, give it up with one last dying sigh only to rise once more and step forward again unto the breach. Each time he leaves a life it is like trying to pull a boot out of muddy ground. He has to brace his feet on the same muddy ground his shoe was given up to and pull as hard as he can, twisting and breaking his back to release it from the suction below – if he can. Sometimes he has to leave a shoe behind, to forever wallow in the memory that seeps between the laces and swamps the sole. 

If he does succeed, his only reward is to place that same boot right back into the mud, only a little bit forward in time. And he feels it sink down with a leaden heart, but he has nowhere else to turn. The mud is his only constant, and even then he can remember when it was young and vibrant and full of delicious possibility. For every step the soft sinking in was the caress of a thousand possible lovers and the resistance pulling out was the siren song of so many desires. No longer. It is old now, churned up and splattered carelessly in his wake. He is old now, too; he is older than dirt and twice as tired.


	4. Belief Prevails

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander, Methos, he's been a holy man more than once

Methos has been a holy man more than once. He’s wandered the globe hundreds of times on pilgrimages and quests and crusades. He’s shed blood and saved lives and wept and laughed and starved and feasted in the name of one religion or the other, and never one has he encountered any higher power all mortals cast their eyes to the cosmos for. He’s tried all major religions more than once, sampled every smaller cult just in case, and still the mystical realms is as lifeless to his eye as every mortal’s. Yet humans keep believing. Religion crops up where none had existed before and then mortals preserve the stories and traditions and customs for millennia despite a holy silence almost as long. They press their hands to their hearts and die for a cause nobody can prove exists because somewhere, embedded deep within them, belief prevails.

Perhaps that is the only miracle needed.


	5. Effort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander, Methos, Continuous effort – not strength or intelligence – is the key to unlocking our potential

The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones. Confucius was not the first nor the last person to arrive at that concept, but Methos must say his phrasing has so far been the best. 

Here’s it another way: Live. Grow stronger. Fight another day.

Continuous effort – not strength or intelligence – is the key to unlocking potential. Taking one more breath, having one more thought, lasting one more minute. Enduring. Surviving. A dead man never has an idea. A dead man never paints a picture or invents a machine. A dead man is simply dead. But an alive man – oh! The possibilities! An alive man can create; an alive man can destroy. He can sing and dance and inspire and detract. He can be the pebble on the mountain that when shaken loose causes an avalanche. 

It is life that leads to progress and invention, that unlocks human’s potential to build miracles and reshape reality. Methos intends to keep on living to see it.


	6. This is not my war

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Author’s choice, author’s choice, “This is not my war. Why did you make this my war?”

The boy chokes and writhes in his arms, trying to draw breath around the blood pooling in his lungs. Methos sighs.

“This is not my war,” he says as the boy whimpers his way towards death. “I had put my sword up long ago. Why did you make this my war?”

But the boy is just a mortal, dead already or as good as. He doesn't answer. Methos rolls the carcass off his legs and stands. He bends down and pulls his sword out, makes a cursory attempt to clean the blade with his sleeve. 

Another mortal rounds the corner, stumbles upon his dead friend and his dead friend’s murderer and blanches. Methos pursues in search of answers.


	7. Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: author's choice, author's choice, “The trick iIs finding someone who complements you instead of completes you. You need to be complete on your own.”

Methos has had sixty seven wives. Some he married for political reasons; some he married to grant them the protection of his name; some he married for lust. A very few he’s married for love. 

Love, you see, is messy. Love is dependency; love is devotion. Love is something that, if allowed to settle into your heart, infects like a cancer. 

Methos is lucky. He survived it once. Only once, and he doesn’t think he could do it again. Three thousand years later and its consequences still come back to haunt him. There are still stories about him, cursed with immortal life but fallen in love with a mortal.

He learned from that. It’s the settling that kills you – the acclimation, the years of happiness. He knows to guard himself, keep everything at hand’s reach. The trick is finding someone who complements you instead of completes you. You need to be complete on your own. If not, the loss gnaws at you, grows every day until it’s an aching, insatiable thing. Then that darkness sucks you down with it, collapses in on itself until nothing is left. 

He’s learned his lesson about love. Lesser emotions suit him just fine.


	8. Dragon

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: any, any, fairytales tell the children dragons can be killed

Fairytales tell the children dragons can be killed, but everyone knows there are no such things as dragons. So, too, there are some things that cannot be killed - things that walk in human shape, with no leathery wings or sharpened fangs; things that twirl their sword once before bringing it down with an almighty roar (somewhat like a dragon, but scarier for all that it is not). He is not a dragon but he is the closest thing alive to one: old and crafty and dangerous. He narrows golden-tinged eyes and lazily sprawls about, fattened on his hoard of bloody spoils hidden from the common eye – spoils not of gold and gems (though he does have those) but of knowledge and skill won in a thousand Challenges. His fiery words are even more dangerous than the sharpened teeth near the hilt of his sword - quick and darting licks of logic that sear his opponent, melt down armor, scorch the earth around him until it steams with his fury. He is arrogant and assured of his might; he accepts the challenge of knights with a dismissive snort and a curl of his lips, confident of his victory. Fairytales tell the children dragons can be killed, but he is not quite a dragon. He, after all, cannot be killed.


	9. Crossroads

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Supernatural / Highlander, Dean & Methos, while apparently hanging out with Lucifer is fun for a while, Death will sell out meagre things like the apocalypse over a beer

Death cracks open the top and takes a sip with a groan of pleasure that makes Dean really uncomfortable. He finally stops after draining nearly half the bottle with one a long gulp and wipes his mouth with a satisfied smile. “I cannot tell you how long I’ve been dying for one of those,” he says, lifting the bottles in a toast towards Dean.

Dean doesn’t appreciate the pun. But he’s going to bite his tongue, channel his inner Sam and brownnose his heart out, because this one last desperate play might actually end up saving all their asses. “Anything else you need?”

“Well, a buddy of mind has been working on fixing up this old house, and the landscaping is next. Perhaps a shrubbery or two?”

Dean thinks about it for a moment before realizing – 

Death’s lips twitch and he takes another swig of beer. “One that looks nice. Not too expensive. Perhaps something two-tiered?”

“Dude, Monty Python?”

Death cocks his head to the side, considers it, and drains the beer in one last gulp. “Nah.” He tosses the empty bottle back at Dean, turns away, and saunters into the night. 

“I’ll get it myself,” he calls back, just before him and his trenchcoat fades out of sight. 

Dean shakes his head. “I hope that means you’re holding up your end of the bargain,” he mutters. Then he climbs in the Impala and drives away from the crossroads in the opposite direction, rumble fading into the distance until all that’s left of their meeting is one bottle cap, carelessly dropped to the side, half-sunk in the sand and near-invisible in the dark.


	10. Favors

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: “I saved your life,” [?] says. “You shouldn’t have,” [?] replies.

The blade rests on the back of his neck; measuring for a clean stroke, the barest of mercies. The energy he would need to resist such a strike is gone, bled out from the knife wound in his groin and splattered around their battleground. 

“I saved your life,” Duncan says. 

“You shouldn’t have,” Methos replies. “And I don’t owe favors to the dead.”


	11. Shadows

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Any fandom involving immortal/long-lived species, any characters, "We are to them as passing shadows"

He calls you friend, but in your mind are words from dusty Chronicles of past Watchers. One, who you’ve found less dry than most, once wrote: _We are to them as passing shadows._

You wonder if he would agree with it. How long has he lived? Five thousand, as he claims? Less? More? Long enough that sixty years is a paltry number left behind long ago.

He is good at making you forget that, though. He is not as rooted as other Immortals who cling to this or that from their past – Mac his name, Darius his faith, Amanda her trade. Even Kalas had his revenge and Kronos his legacy. 

Or perhaps, sometimes you half wonder, that which he claims is so vast you cannot see it. What does a man older than human history claim as his?

When you were younger, you would stretch above a lamp and make dog and rabbit and crocodile shadow puppets on the ceiling to amuse yourself. You wonder if that’s just what he’s doing – entertaining himself by interacting with the shadows that flicker across his walls, pretending that this silhouette is a human and that there a country. Do any of them last long enough to grow an attachment to?

You've seen him take on so many shapes – doctor, lawyer, protector, sycophant, student, lover, idealist, cynic, killer – that you can almost imagine the real him standing in front of a fire, twisting his arms and contorting himself to throw sharp shadows dancing through time. Perhaps the fire is in the past, an ancient campfire from his birthplace; perhaps it’s in the future, the burning remains of a civilization Methos has helped destroy. 

How does a man survive five thousand years? It’s a secret that you, as mortal as you are, will never know. You have your own shadows creeping up on you, doctors grim as they point them out on your scans. One way or another, shadow is soon all you will be.


	12. Rooftop Soiree

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander, Methos +/ Amanda, more than six thousand years of experience between them, and they still can't stay out of trouble

Methos doesn’t bother to curse quietly when he falls off a corroded fire escape and lands with the Buzz ringing in his ears; he’s already blown any chance of escape he might have by landing directly on top of whichever Immortal is skulking around the same neighborhood as he at this hour. He wheezes, “Fuck!” as loud as he can and throws an elbow out, catching his opponent in something squishy. 

“Umphf!” The Immortal wriggles beneath him until one fine-boned hand wraps around Methos’ wrist and twists. He can either roll with it or break his wrist, and given the impending sword fight Methos choses the former. The Immortal helps him off with a swift boot aimed at his groin that Methos just barely bends away from, hitting his flank instead. 

By the time Methos is on the ground, as opposed to on top of his opponent, he’s pried the fingers far enough apart to wrench his arm away. He rolls off his back and onto his knees, sword digging into his ribs, and unsteadily lurches to his feet. Through the deep gloom of the alley Methos can see the Immortal has done the same. 

Methos goes for his sword, but the Immortal kicks him again – this time in the side, trying to trap his hand in the lining of his jacket. He steps back to maintain his balance and brushes against the rough brick of the warehouse behind him. Not good. Methos swipes at the leg his opponent still has on the ground with his own, launches himself forward, and brings them tumbling to the ground once more.

He’s in a better position this time, but the damned Immortal is almost too fast; before Methos has time to reach back and unsheathe his knife – one shot at the torso, that’s all he needs to finish this and disappear before the headhunter comes to and tracks him back home – he’s kicked at once again as the Immortal twists a leg around to strike at him. It’s only half power, but still enough that Methos has to bring his hand down to balance himself, pressing down on the Immortal’s chest and dropping his elbow to shield himself from at least one potential arm strike.

“Hey!”

Oh, hell. That voice is familiar. He’s also touching something very squishy. What are the odds? Given their history, way too likely. 

“Amanda?”

_“Methos?”_

“Why were you following me?”

“Why do you always go for the boob shots?”

“Amanda. Why were you following me?”

Amanda pulls at the inside of his elbow with the arm he’s trying to pin her down with and brings the other one up to push his forearm. Methos’ arm follows the natural bend and smacks him in the face. 

“Argh!”

Methos rolls off to nurse his stinging nose. She kicks him in the shins spitefully then peels off the mask of her burglar’s outfit, shaking out matted platinum hair. 

“I wasn’t following you,” she says with a self-righteous tilt of her chin. “You were following me.”

“Was not!”

“I’m the professional thief. You’re the amateur. Therefore you’re the one sticking his big nose where it doesn’t belong.”

“Enough with the nose shots.”

“Besides, I don’t even know why you would be casing a warehouse in the first place. Aren’t you an academic again?”

“Academic and thief aren’t always mutually exclusive titles.”

Amanda tosses her head to the side. “Yes, yes, tell me again how your work was plagiarized in the 16th century. Or is it the 18th this time? You’ve invented so many things, I can’t keep track anymore.”

“Yes, well,” Methos mutters. Time to save face, of a sort. “I’m glad it was you lurking around. I thought you were someone else.”

“What? Who?”

“Someone I’d rather risk tetanus from a half-corroded fire escape than meet.”

“That doesn’t really narrow down the list, Methos. You run away from everyone.”

“Thank you.”

“Besides, why didn’t you just go a few blocks over instead of assuming I was him right away?”

Methos peers at Amanda closely. Her face is half-hidden in shadow, and he can’t see if she’s joking or not. “But Amanda,” he says slowly. “You’ve been following me for ten minutes.”

They stare at each other. A Buzz dances faintly across their senses and disappears. Then it comes back. 

“The fire escape, you said?”

“Boost me up first.”

“You leave me down here and I won’t show you the roof escape I was planning.”

“Shh, he’s going to hear you!”

“DAVID!”

“Too late.”

“Really? ‘David?’ Don’t tell me, that’s Goliath.”

“Close enough. Keep climbing! He’s afraid of heights.”

“When we’re out of this, you’re telling me everything.”

“COME BACK, COWARD!”

Amanda laughs. “It’s like he doesn’t even known you!”

“Keep moving,” Methos grumbles. “I left my carry-out seven blocks over.”


	13. Iceberg

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander, Methos/Kronos, flirting

They court over a series of centuries. Their build is a slow one, pressure mounting like two glaciers crushing against each other as they plow over hill and valley. The pressure builds and builds, and from its frozen power they gouge into the world new shapes and purposes. 

That’s not to say the courtship itself is frozen. It’s bloody, and destructive, and _oh so fun_. The bones of civilizations are their flowers, the last screams in a dying language their sweet melodies. They rage and tear at the world and bring its mutilated remains to the other, displaying it in a macabre reconstruction of what had been and a mockery of what it could have been.

But the emotions underlying it, those are as frigid and calculated as Death’s cold iron mask. They flirt for a millennium, with biting kisses and nips of bloodied fingers, but it’s about power and possession, about Death versus the End of Time and who will consume who when all things converge. 

Then one day End of Time sees a slave girl (one of many, and there have been so many) watching Death with doe eyes, bringing him cool water and the freshest of fruit. He sees Death kill her and let the deed become undone, sees him consider her with a peacefulness Immortals will never receive from true death. The glacier cracks, a fissure deep and yawning. Hot life spurts up with a vengeance, and Kronos looks at Methos. Suddenly, he _wants_.

Kronos chases off the girl, but when he tries to lay claim to Methos he finds himself against a reptilian coldness. No longer is Kronos satisfied with the sexless innuendo that has occupied their time. Now he wants it, urgent and fumbling and Methos arching under him. Come to me, Horseman, he says. He is the leader and they should obey. 

But where End of Time is an inevitability waiting at the end of all roads, Death is a nebulous visitor that can come at any point, and disappears a moment after his visitation. He disdains the advances, and only permits Kronos a few tantalizing moments before turning away. Eventually, though, Death does come to him. That’s what Kronos remembers. Methos does it in his own sweet time – always has, even before the desert and the horses and Death – but it will always happen.

Kronos pesters and batters down Death until finally he appears in his tent, face alabaster-smooth and eyes narrow. He stands, arms loose at his side, and allows Kronos’ touches to become bold. 

_You want this?_ He asks.

 _I do,_ Kronos avows. And he has always taken what he wants.

When Kronos has finished, Death leaves the tent as he came in: face alabaster-smooth and eyes narrow. Kronos, sated, sleeps heavily. Silas and Caspian are motionless in their tents, blades sunk between fourth and fifth ribs. The horses and slaves have died in their sleep, corpses grotesquely bloated after drinking the poisoned water.

Kronos grasps for what he wants, and Death slips quietly into the desert on his white mare.


	14. Bloody Water

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Any, any, Water is patient... Water just waits. Wears down the cliff tops, the mountains. The whole of the world. Water always wins. Doctor Who, Ten, The Waters of Mars

The mortals say blood is thicker than water and pretend that's a good thing. For them maybe it is. Their lives are so short they can’t witness the true power of water. They have to live with the vitality allowed to them, that burns through their veins and is gone mere moments later, and so they invest it in those closest to them: those given to them by fate and fortune. The bonds they form are as tenuous and fleeting as their own longevity. 

But Methos, he lives beyond blood. He has seen the power of water. Not only in its flood and rains and great waves, but in its steady drips and still pools. Water just waits. Wears down the cliff tops, the mountains, the whole of the word. Water always wins in the end. There are bonds formed that run deeper than blood - bonds that run like water, bonds that twine through the marrow of his bones and the essence of his Quickening. These bonds saturate every open space and wear away all resistance.

And the steady drip is now echoing to him, _brother. Brother mine, come to me._


	15. Escape Plan

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander, 4 Horsemen, Kronos dreams of meeting up with his brothers, of riding out of the sun again, while Duncan is chasing him through the American west

Kronos squints against the harsh sunlight and scrapes dust from his teeth. Methos, as outwardly serene as he always is, calmly paces his white horse back and forth across the crown of the hill. He’s always preferred spirited ones who seem to skip over the desert, hardly dusting a hoof before raising it again in a high-stepping prance. 

Behind him Caspian snickers. His horse snorts and pulls against the reins nervously at the sound. “Tired already, brother? Brains fried by the sun? They’re so tasty that way.”

Kronos would spit if he had any saliva left. Instead he bares his teeth in a noiseless snarl. He has been walking ever since he’d clawed his way out of the shallow grave MacLeod’s posse had dug for him, with neither rest nor water. His mind has slowed, but he is in no way _tired_. Kronos looks closer and sees it – the faintly discolored back corner of the local jail, pissed upon by so many drunkards it has become rotted and soft. 

“Strike at dusk,” Methos says. “The sheriff will be into his cups at the saloon, feeling safe because the keys jingle at his side. His deputy on duty will be easy to keep quiet. Once he’s dead you can free the men without an alarm. The horses will be stabled after a hard day’s work, and no one will look for them until morning. You can ride all night before anyone misses them.”

As Methos said, so it will be. Kronos slides his blade into the back of the deputy and pries away the rear wall of the prison. The men scatter like flung chaff towards greener lands, laying a dozen false trails for MacLeod chase after. Kronos returns to the desert with naught but a blade strapped to his back and a stolen horse between his thighs. 

Silas’ laughter booms as he falls in stride next to Kronos, a strong chestnut horse of the line Silas has carefully bred for centuries surging beneath him. “Good fight, brother!” Caspian ranges ahead, his horse letting out a wild cry. Kronos stands to feel the wind stream past, reveling in the power. 

Silas and Caspian race into the darkness of nightfall. Kronos turns towards his last brother watching it all from his dancing horse. This far away he shimmers like a mirage. Later, he will track Methos down and pin him writhing to the floor until he acknowledges the flesh and bone Kronos knows he has. For now he allows his brother to slip away on the breeze with a promise as ancient as he.

The Horsemen will ride again. In the meantime, Kronos turns his mount south.


	16. Double Vision

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> AU – what if Methos had said “Kronos – “ instead of “Kronos?” when he was getting stabbed. And what if the rest of that sentence was, “Kronos sent you?”

Methos has to get through exactly five security checks before he’s allowed in the building and even then, most areas are restricted by pass-codes and guards. Luckily the area he’s going to has had the same rotation of security combinations for half a century. He adjusts the pilfered lab coat, taps the sequence in, and nods cordially to the guard. 

The guard frowns at Methos’s lack of ID, but this hallway is always getting strange visitors. Methos goes through unchallenged.

He walks past the sterilized walls, ignores the odd animal noise coming from the testing room, and finally turns into the single open doorway at the end of the hallway, second to the last on the left. A man is inside, hunched over a microscope. Methos steps inside and sits down in one of the empty chairs. 

The other man studiously examines the sample underneath his microscope as the silence stretches onward.

Finally, Methos sighs. “The next time you feel like sending yourself to visit me, brother, it would behoove you to brainwash a much less melodramatic stand-in. You’re lucky he managed to convince Cassandra like he did, or nobody would have believed it. Torches, Kronos. He was still using torches for light and bonfires to cook.”

The other man looks up and smiles. His eyes, the left one bisected by a long scar, crinkled with the motion. “But he did well, did he not? Even Cassandra believed the charade.”

Methos leaned in. “Yes, I am curious how you managed _that_ sleight of hand.”

“Monsters in face paint, brother, that’s all the rest of us were to her. Teach him enough references, condition the right responses, and she would come to the necessary conclusions.”

“Perhaps.”

“You doubt me?”

“That will not work again as long as MacLeod is around.”

“Ah, yes. How is the righteous barbarian?”

“Your stand-in didn’t like him either.”

“Hmm. I taught him good taste. There was a time you didn’t tolerate such judgmental babes.”

“There was a time you could did not need to entertain yourself with such destructive pets.”

Kronos sighs. “Yes, there was. But you and I know that the time for such unrestrained pleasures has ceased.”

The strategist of the Horseman leans back in the chair next to his oldest brother. “Yes,” he sighs. “For now it has. But one day we will ride again.”

“Imagine that, brother.” Kronos smiles and returns to his cultures. “Imagine that.”


	17. Honor Guard

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander (tv series), any, Duncan dies instead of Richie

“He –“ Richie’s voice breaks as he looks down at the corpse. “I –“ His hands are so numb he dropped his sword a long time (how long?) ago and his knees are so weak he’s quivering where he stands. “He would’ve –“ Richie chokes out. Methos steps forward to grip the young man’s shoulder, and stands firm as Richie shakes apart from grief. “He tried –“

“I know,” Methos murmurs. “Hush.” Lost and directionless, Richie does as he is told, leaning into Methos’ arm even as his eyes remain fixed on the corpse of Duncan MacLeod, seeking out the nearest warm body in an effort to combat the death that lies in front of him. 

Methos allows himself only a fleeting glance at the carnage as he slowly begins steering Richie towards an exit. Let Dawson care for the dead; Methos has the living to take care of. Richie tries to resist as Methos finally pulls him out of sight of the body, but it is a token gesture at best. With only a slight tug on his collar he quietly follows Methos back to the car and slips into the backseat without protest. 

By the time Methos settles himself into the driver’s seat, Richie has curled into a fetal position. The quivering has died, replaced with a grievous lethargy. He stays that way the entire drive back to Methos’ flat, and this time requires more persuasion to begin moving again. Together they stumble up three flights of stairs, and Methos doesn’t let Richie stop until he’s standing underneath a scalding shower, skin reddening and almost-blistering before his Immortal healing smoothes the wounds away. Methos bathes the boy like he would a child, murmuring softly for the sake of comfort and washing the boy’s hair for the same reason as he lets the shower run until the water is clear of blood. 

Richie’s eyes are hooded with exhaustion but dry when Methos dries him off, and he topples over onto Methos’ bed with the slightest of shoves. He absently clutches the blankets Methos piles on him and stares off into a middle distance as if unsure of what to do now that he’s lying down. There’s not much Methos can do about the shock, however; Richie will rouse himself when and only when he is able to. So he flips off the lights, gently shuts the bedroom door, and leaves the boy to his own thoughts. 

He adjusts the thermostat to a higher temperature before delving into the back of his liquor cabinet. In another hour, Dawson will most likely finish arranging things for Mac. He’ll be dropping by, angry and with nobody else to take it out on but Methos, who ostensibly walked away from the Highlander’s without a second thought. After the inevitably rage, the hissed accusations and the tears as Dawson works through the death of his friend, they’ll both need a drink. 

Methos waits silently, unmoving, for the entirety of that hour. He sits and breathes and thinks. It’s habit by now, this mental clean-up, compartmentalizing and dividing and looking over, firmly lodging memories in the could not change category. When Joe finally knocks softly on the door, Methos’ hands have finally stopped trembling. 

Joe looks like shit. His hair is rumpled, his eyes are swollen half-shut, his five-o-clock shadow is now at quarter-past one in the morning, and his clothes are wrinkled and starting to smell, with a stain on the hem of his coat sleeve. He limps heavily past Methos without a word and collapses on the nearest couch. Methos brings out the prepared booze, and Joe downs his first cup without stopping despite the way it makes him gasp afterwards. 

Methos listens to Joe’s harsh breathing as he fills the cup again, waits for it to even out into something tightly controlled. He sits down across from Dawson, coffee table safely between them. It’ll be coming any second now.

“How’s Richie?”

Or not. Methos remembers why he likes this mortal so much: wisdom beyond his age.

Joe looks at Methos’ face and seems to recognize the taken-aback stare. He doesn’t smile – neither of them at this point probably could if they wanted – but one side of his mouth quirks in forgiveness. He’s done this before, dealt with unexpected grief that whaps you upside the head when you’re least expecting it, and it’s alright if Methos forgot that for a while. Joe might still be angry, but he knows it’s misplaced, aimed at a necessary division of labor, and won’t air it out tonight. 

“Sleeping,” Methos eventually replies. Joe nods and sits back. Neither of them have energy for conversation right now. Their minds always circle back to the same scene: the body lying slack, the ooze of blood, the rounded object in the corner neither of them had the inclination to identify. It’s enough to sit in the same room, listening to the other’s soft breathing as they live through the grief. 

They each finish their glasses, and Methos refills them once more. By unspoken agreement they raise them together and shoot them back, gasping at the burn. Joe wipes his eyes afterwards, breathing heavily. Methos looks until Joe, once more in tenuous control, asks, “What next?”

Methos refills his glass again to buy time. He has plans – always has plans. It’s easy when you’ve had enough time to confront similar situations before. So he watches the glass fill and allows himself to shuffle through all the ideas floating through his head until he finds bits and pieces that feel right, associates them loosely into a course of action. 

“Richie needs a teacher,” he finally says. “And the Council will want him to have a Watcher.” 

Joe exhales slowly, nodding. “He won’t want either.”

Yes, that’s the problem. But if they start now, insinuate themselves into Richie’s life when he’s vulnerable, he won’t get a choice. It’s perhaps not correct by modern standards, but it’s the best thing to do. Joe will have to be upfront about his change of assignment, of course. That will be hard for Richie to accept, one more reminder of who he’s lost. But Methos can help it along. He’ll be the one Richie can rely on, be the boy’s strength until he gets his own back. Richie isn’t old enough yet to take on the world, still immature in some ways: brash and bold and courageous. 

Everything MacLeod taught him to be – which doesn’t exactly equal long life. 

The word teacher will never be mentioned. That’s another man’s title. But Methos will be a guide, tempering those deadly impulses with cunning and sense and self-interest and patience. He’ll ensure the closest thing MacLeod had to a son lives on for a very long time, strong and sure and unbroken. He’s done it before, for mortals and immortals alike. He can do it again.

In response to Joe’s statement, Methos raises his glass. “To tough times but great rewards.” 

It’s the closest he’ll go to letting Joe in on the plan, and if the mortal had been in a mood to argue he would have jumped on that non-answer the minute it was out of Methos’ mouth. But right now, Joe solemnly raises his own glass in response, trusting that Methos has a plan to get them through this and that it will work without Joe’s input. “Amen, brother,” he says. They drink. Methos refills their glasses once more.


	18. Chapter 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Tortall/Highlander, George Cooper + Methos, honor among thieves

The Dancing Dove is George's throne, but even a king knows to give deference to a god. He sits across from George with a mug of the Dove's best ale, and above the cup his irises shift from dark green to burnt umber. Is there anything else he needs? George asks.

Just checking in, he assures George. More than a few of his creatures reside in the capital of Tortall. It is due for some very interesting changes in the upcoming years.


	19. Walk the Lands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander/Game of Thrones, Methos + any, winter is coming

North of the Wall a giant stirs in an ice-encrusted cave, jaw creaking as he breaks through the frost coating his face. He's been sleeping for a long time, and the echoing call of his brothers stirs his aching heart. He marches South.

In the East a madman sniffs the air, loose entrails dangling from his fingertips. He finishes his meal raw and slays the other screaming slaves, mixing their blood with the ashes of his fire to paint his face. He's been hungry for this for a long time. He marches West.

In the South a god marches through volcanic wasteland, breathing in the toxic fumes and walking fearlessly on ever-shifting ground. He lofts high a Valyrian steel sword, still wet with the blood of the family that claims it, and laughs as lightning strikes him. He hears the songs of his brothers and points his sword North. 

In the West a stranger sits in a tavern, listening to the common folk share dark words. Five kings are marching and the land is suffering for it. He drinks his pint of ale and orders another, laying down gold on the table stamped with markings that the innkeeper doesn't recognize. _My brothers,_ he calls out. _Come to me._ Ruin is nigh in Westeros.


	20. From a God to a Beggar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Highlander, Methos ( + the Horsemen), burn everything you love, then burn the ashes

Once to cleanse and two to destroy. You rid yourself of everything completely, that which would not burn melted and stirred into the earth once more. One knife you leave on the site, sunken to the hilt in a grave mound of dirt. As utterly destroyed as the rest of it is, you feel no pain in leaving it. That was, after all, the aim of this endeavor in the first place. 

Naked against the fierce sun your skin blisters and sheds a dozen times over. You walk on to a new pair of feet, scrub your hands afresh, and regrow your shorn hair. You arrive in the next town a beggar, fighting with the feral dogs for scraps in the sewage.

The cycle begins again.


	21. Chapter 21

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: any. any supernatural character. instinct

You die and wake up something strange, with lightning running through your veins and eternity courting you into the unknown. The first one you meet like you tells you the rules and abandons you to fate, unwilling to take on a student. Others like you look sidelong in Challenge and you accept, fumbling your sword out of its scabbard. 

But when you swing you swing for the head, and your heart races in expectation before the Quickening even starts to rise. Deep down you've always known -- There can only be one.


	22. Highlander/Buffy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Written for the prompt: Highlander/any vampire 'verse, Methos, his age has a taste

“Blech! What the bloody _buggering_ hell do you eat? Flambéd dirt?” 

Spike’s victim looks less shocked at the vampire’s attack and subsequent outburst and more indignant about the mouthful of blood said vampire recently spat up onto his boots, but Spike’s not about to let that stop his rant. “Honestly, I went through all the trouble to stalk you through the streets and jump you in a dark alleyway – true, back-to-basics technique here! – only for you to ruin my flawless execution by not having the decency to eat something tasteful before you went gallivanting around looking to be bit!”

Dirt-nap opens his mouth to respond, but after doing Spike that much offense, he feels perfectly justified in snapping the ponce’s neck before he gets a word out, letting the body drop where it stands. 

“Let that teach you to eat better,” he grumbles at the corpse, licking his fangs once more to get all traces of that disgusting bite off of them. He spits on the ground one more time before leaving the alley in search of tastier fare. “Kids these days,” he grumbles. “It’s all orange space food now.”

(He doesn’t notice the small sparks of blue electricity dancing underneath the dead man’s skin)


End file.
